We've switched from a static to a database-driven web site. How come I'm still experiencing slow pages and high server load?
The design of your site's HTML templates is bloated.
Database-driven sites solve the problem of separating some content from the presentation. But the cobblestones of the web interface — in your case the template files — need a remake, using leaner code and web standards, to fulfil the separation of presentation data and actual content, leading to faster servers and decreased bandwidth costs.